Are E-Cigarettes Really Better For You?

ST. PETERSBURG, FL -- Make no mistake, millions of Americans still smoke, but numbers are dropping. However, a new kind of cigarette is now lighting up interest.

You can find electronic or e-cigarettes at convenience stores and specialized shops like Lizard Juice. Gary Wilder has opened up several Lizard Juice locations in just the past year. The stores are bright and clean and there's no smoke.

"It's the anti-smoke shop," laughs Wilder. "We're the place you can bring your mother."

At Lizard Juice and similar stores, Vapers (as fans of e-cigs are called) can puff a wide variety of flavored nicotine-laced liquid.

"That is double coconut and a touch of chocolate," Wilder says as he offers Dawna Jikah a sample. "Ooh, that's very good," she says.

Jikah made the switch to e-cigarettes after smoking traditional cigarettes for 25 years.

"I used to wheeze when I lay down to go to sleep. I can run. I can do all sorts of things I couldn't do before," she says.

Every Lizard Juice customer 10 News spoke with made similar remarks. They were all smoking e-cigarettes instead of traditional tobacco, seeking the health benefits.

So are e-cigarettes really better for you?

With e-cigs, you've still got the dose of highly addictive nicotine, but users are not inhaling the harmful tars and cancer-causing chemicals that come with smoking regular cigarettes. And that's why Moffitt tobacco and smoking researcher Thomas Brandon is cautiously optimistic.

"Most researchers believe that it is very likely that e-cigarettes are far less dangerous than smoking," says Brandon. But he adds that since e-cigarettes are fairly new, there hasn't been a chance to do long-term studies. "It's still an open question."